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8 posts from Susan Merrill.
Have you ever been praying and all of the sudden, you are prompted in a way you have never experienced before? I think moms, in general, are intuitive; however, we doubt ourselves. We wonder if what we heard was from God or from our own flesh. Here are three things to put into practice to identify God’s voice from all the other voices that are coming at you daily.
Read Post →One morning, during one of our content meetings, I asked our team if they had been reading anything interesting in their Bibles. After a few minutes of quiet, our intern spoke up and mentioned a passage in Ezekiel 37, which talks about the vision of the valley of dry bones. This creepy vision produced an intriguing conversation. We learned that dry bones represented Israel when they were in captivity to Babylon. Like unburied skeletons, the Israelites were in a state of living death, pining away with no end to their captivity in sight.
Read Post →A few months ago in a previous vlog, I went on a panoptic journey through the Bible focusing solely on women. The study led me to a discovery about two female powerhouses: Ruth and Esther. In my research, I clearly saw how God uses each of us no matter our background. Whether Jew or Gentile, rich or poor, powerful or peaceful–God has a part for you to play in HIStory. In my panoptic wandering, there were so many stories I wanted to dig into deeper. The first is the Rahab story. Rahab, the prostitute, the woman known for housing spies against her king’s orders, the woman who loved a foreign God, the woman who intrigues me. What did she look like? How did she become so wise? What was her personality? If you are new to this blog you may not know that I am fascinated by our personalities and how they play into our story. You can take The Mom I Am personality test here and read about your personality type here. One day I hope to record The Mom I Am speech. It is about God’s desire for you to embrace and be excited about who you are, a woman with …
Read Post →When my alarm goes off there is just one thought that gets me out of bed. It urgently whispers to my sleepy brain, “Hurry, get up. This is your time!” Yes, my only time. My time is a sweet, short span of an hour during which I creep quietly downstairs, grab hot creamy coffee, snuggle into my chair under a super soft blanket and read about God. It’s just us in the dark quiet before my house becomes crazy busy. The Bible is full of wisdom for those who treasure reading and soaking it in. It teaches us His character, His love, and it teaches us about ourselves. Studying the Bible has become one of my favorite things to do. Every morning it reorients my life as I learn a new perspective. We all have things we are passionate about but nothing makes me more excited than making connections throughout God’s Word. I will pick a topic of interest to me at the moment and start to research it. I start in one place or with one theme but typically end up going down rabbit trails until I find I have discovered something totally unexpected. Time and time again new things …
Read Post →An iMOM writer recently asked me an interesting question: what are three things I learned the hard way that I wish I could teach my children. Of course my mind scrambled. Ha, I thought, how about 3 billion things? But what are some of my life lessons, the big picture things? I thought of these three right away, and in the comments section, I would love to hear about some of yours! 1. Time will run out. When I was seventeen, I had a cardiac arrest. I learned the hard way that you never know when you’re going to run out of time. I was cheerleading at a game, and my heart felt like it was beating so fast. I found out later it was doing 220 beats per minute for three hours straight. A couple hours later when I was in the emergency room, my heart stopped. Since then I’ve had about a dozen heart surgeries. I always think when I go into surgery: Okay, is this it? Has my time run out? What have I done with the time I was given? Will I have more time? When I wake up after the surgery, the first thing I think …
Read Post →I am in the zone–the two months to book launch zone. The pressure is building to prepare a platform, build my home base, expand my social media reach, and create a WOW experience for moms. I am out of my comfort zone. Growing iMOM.com was much more comfortable than growing my platform for The Passionate MOM book release. So, I am at the Platform Conference to learn from the master, Michael Hyatt (above with Courtney Rohrdanz, our resident iMOM.com web and social media expert). I am not here to be comfortable but to take risks. It is risky to try to do something you never thought you could do or even wanted to do. I don’t really want a “platform.” I just want to help moms be the best they can be. But Michael says if you want them to see and hear you above the noise of the world you have to build your “platform.” I would do that for you, in the hopes that you will hear me. Because when the book releases I am hoping you will leave your comfort zone and read The Passionate Mom…Dare To Parent In Today’s World. And I am hoping that you will …
Read Post →3 things. There are only 3 things that matter in life. When I was seventeen I learned that my days were numbered. I had a cardiac arrest. I was a senior in high school and our football team was in the district championship. The game was intense, and I was on the sidelines as a cheerleader catching every play in living color. This game, this senior experience, is why I had stayed in Florida. Three months earlier my family had moved to Texas. I begged my parents to let me stay with my grandmother, just for the fall, just for one more semester. They agreed. So there I was at the big game, so thankful and so excited. Cheerleaders are supposed to get excited but I must have overdone it. There was a huge upset in the game and I went crazy jumping and screaming wildly. The next play was called and my team pressed on. Everyone stood frozen in focused anticipation. I was right there with them, standing still, my breathing slowed. My heart did not. Two hours later, the game was long over and our team had won but my heart was still racing like there was a …
Read Post →Are there seven steps to give up over-committing your time? I have been a chronic over-committer from birth. It has been a problem that has severely stressed my marriage on many levels. I have a hard time saying “no” because I always feel like I should help. Recently, we were in an Espresso Minute brainstorm meeting and Nancy (our main writer) brought up over-committing as a topic for an email idea. The gist of her solution to over committing was to alleviate the immediate pressure and guilt by delaying the opportunity until you have time for it. In other words your answer is “Not now”. Sure enough within a week I was asked to be on the board of an organization that I love, contribute to and have benefited from. I was flattered, intrigued and then overwhelmed all in one second standing right before the director’s hopeful eyes. And then Nancy’s solution sprang to my mind. I cheerfully explained that I could not serve right now but would consider it again in the Fall after my house renovation and book were complete. He was great with that. I walked away feeling totally devoid of guilt and empowered by the fact that …
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